


Shadowscape

by bittenfeld



Category: I Spy, I Spy (1965)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Betrayal, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape, Rape Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2015-08-01
Packaged: 2018-04-12 11:56:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4478447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bittenfeld/pseuds/bittenfeld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>an unfinished fic.  In the aftermath of torture, Kelly refuses to deal with what happened to him, so Scotty will all he can to help him through it – if Kelly will let him.</p><p>“C’mon now,” Scott reassured softly.  “Everything’s all right now.  C’mon.”<br/>“Yeah.  Sure.”  Nervously Kelly tapped out a cigarette.  “Everything’s just peachy-keen, folks.  I always entertain my room-mate with hours of screaming terrors.  Such a fun-filled way to spend the night.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Scott’s eyes flickered open.

Automatically his senses scanned the darkness, seeking a clue for whatever had awakened him. But of course he already knew – even before he heard it again.

Harsh whimpers rasped across the shadows. From beneath the blankets on the other side of the room, weak moans of desperation issued and the figure thrashed impotently, tangling up tighter in the sheet cocoon.

Scott felt the last vestiges of dreamland fade away.

One more wide-awake night.

Rubbing a negligent hand over his tired face, Alexander Scott stared up at the ceiling. Ano­ther night, another torment, another panicked flight to illusory escape.

He glanced at the phosphorescent clock-face. Two-thirteen. Last night the devil-chase had commenced at four minutes after midnight. The night before that, one-oh-seven. And Kelly refused to talk about it. Just as he had refused to talk to the human demons who had put him through five days of hell last month.

The whimpers had quieted down now to shallow ragged breaths. Maybe the torment was over for tonight. Maybe Robinson would just slip back into healing dreamless sleep without reawakening. Scott inhaled a slow deep breath of his own, and released a heavy sigh. He was fully awake now. Sleep would elude him for the rest of the night. It always did, once the night terrors across the room had roused him.

After the first few nights, he’d tried sleeping on the couch in the living room. But even then, his finely-honed senses did their duty and wakened him at the first soft cries down the hall. Like a mother subliminally alert for the slightest noise from a sick child.

So he’d moved back into the bedroom, with the hope that maybe his presence at least could be of some comfort to his sleeping partner. At least Kelly was quiet now. That was a blessing. Please, God, no more interruptions tonight.

A sharp muffled grunt. The plea dissipated in Scott’s mind. No, no divine mercy tonight.

“… no!...” a mumbled voice begged beneath the swathe of covers. “… god no!...” and the body shuddered.

“Kel, wake up,” Scott murmured gently, reaching out a hand to the night-stand to snap on the table lamp. Then climbing out of bed, he crossed the room and nudged the blanket-bound figure. “C’mon, that’s enough, wake up.”

At his touch, the form jerked sharply. An explosive breathless grunt, “… unhhh!...” then a moment of tenuous silence, followed by a deep shaky inhalation and a moan of release, “… oh god…”

“You okay?” the black man inquired solicitously.

Another couple of slow controlled breaths, then a phlegmy rasp, “… yeah…” After a throat-clearing cough, Kelly reiterated in a steadier voice, “Yeah.” But as he tried to clamber free of the re­stric­tive bed-clothes, the wrapping hindered his limbs, and he only managed to tangle himself tighter. Another moan gurgled up from his throat, as though the confinement evoked a portion of the night­mare to waking reality. Then another, this one tinged with panic. “… no!...”

“C’mon now,” Scott reassured softly, helping to straightened the disarrayed covers and free his partner. “C’mon, that’s better now. Everything’s all right now. C’mon.”

“Yeah. Sure.” As a last anxious precaution, Robinson kicked the offending blankets to the foot of the bed where they couldn’t surreptitiously ensnare him again. And reaching a shaky hand to the night-stand, he found his lighter and half-full pack on Luckys. Nervously he tapped out a cigar­ette. “Everything’s just peachy-keen, folks. I always entertain my room-mate with hours of scream­ing terrors. Such a fun-filled way to spend the night.”

Scott just shook his head in the dim light, and returned to sit on the edge of his own bed. “I’m sorry, Kel,” he apologized quietly. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Sure. Whatever.”

A tiny flame flared near the other man’s lips, momentarily illuminating a taut face, then the lighter clicked shut. A long draw of the filtered smoke, followed by a hiss of breath through pursed lips. Perfunctorily Robinson pushed his pillow back into shape, then lay back, one arm under his head. “Welcome, folks, to the show that never ends.” Another drag of cool smoke.

The aroma of tobacco drifted over to Scott’s side of the room. He straightened too, unintentionally replicating the other man’s pose. How many more nights of this? How many more before one of them totally lost their sanity?

“Listen, you wanna talk about it?” the black man ventured.

“No.”

“Kel…”

“No, I do not want to talk about it, thank you very much.”

“Kelly…” Again Scott rubbed his face, massaging sleep-deprived eyes. “Kelly, it’s been a month now. Let it out. Please. It’s eating you alive. You’ll feel better if you talk about it. Sooner of later you’ve got to let it out.”

A derisive snuff escaped the white man’s nostrils. “You know,” he commented blandly, “that’s what they said too. ‘Let it out. You’ll feel better. Sooner or later you’ll tell us, so why not sooner?’…” His throat clamped down on the words, but he forced them out anyway. “That’s exactly what they said… just before they … fired up the cattle-prod…”

Scott winced, as though the words themselves jolted an electric charge through his nerves. He frowned.

A chill that had nothing to do with the temperature in the room skittered beneath his pajamas. Climbing back under the covers, he pulled the blanket up, and rolled toward the wall. Grotesque images swam unbidden across his inner sight. He could only guess at the memories unreeling in Kelly’s mind.

“Didn’t Anderson already show you the file?” Robinson inquired brusquely.

Crumpling the pillow beneath his cheek, Scott stared at the wall. “Most of it,” he acknow­ledged. “I read your debriefing report, and I saw some of the hospital records.”

“Then you know what they did to me. What happened, happened. So, there’s nothing else to talk about.”

Scott didn’t reply. This was probably the most that Kelly had talked since the rescue and the requisite debriefing. Maybe the time for unburdening had finally arrived. If so, Scott didn’t dare in­terrupt with an ill-considered comment. So he continued to lie there and listen to the ensuing silence.

But evidently Robinson had said all he intended to for the time being. He too seemed content to just lie there and take in the surrounding night-stillness.

This wouldn’t come easy – Scott had resigned himself to that. So, finally he spoke up again. “That isn’t why I’m asking, Kelly. It isn’t for me, it’s for you. You’ve got to do it for yourself.”

“And thank you, Dr. Freud. I don’t have to do it for myself. I know what happened.” Another nervous pull on the cigarette. “I was there – remember?”

Scott shook his head against the pillow. “It isn’t about knowing what happened. It’s about dealing with it.”

“I am dealing with it.”

“How? By waking up every night for a month with screaming nightmares?”

“Well, excuse me for keeping you up all night. Why don’t you sleep in the other room if it bothers you? Or put in a requisition for ear-plugs or somethings. I’m sure the office would let you charge it to your expense account.”

No, this wasn’t going to come easy at all. “Kelly, that’s not the point. You need to get your head together. You’ve been injured, and you need to heal. Anderson had no business putting you back out so soon. Your nerves need time to settle.”

The other man said nothing; just released a last waft of smoke before stubbing out the butt in the ashtray on the night-stand.

“Not to mention,” Scott continued, “that neither one of us has had a decent night’s sleep in four weeks. We’re no longer functioning optimally out in the field. We’re both starting to slip up. Our reaction times are down. And sooner or later, some mistake is going to get one of us hurt – or killed.”

Robinson continued to stare up at the ceiling. “If you think I can’t hack it, just say so. If you want another partner, if you don’t trust me out in the field anymore, Anderson can team you up with someone else. I won’t stop you.”

Again Scott’s head shook. “I don’t want another partner. I don’t need another partner. Kelly Robinson is my partner, man. What I need is for him to get well. I’m here to listen. Talk to me.”

“No.”

A heavy sigh of resignation hissed from Scott’s nostrils. Kelly would no more talk now, than he had talked a month ago to his torturers. Any more prompting, and he would probably shut down completely.

Switching off the lamp, Scott settled back into bed, and surrendered. “Whatever, Kel. It’s your dance.”

“Yes. It is.” Tight lips cut off the sentence.  
* * * * *

“Kelly Robinson is gonna get you killed some day, man.”

The sound from across the room snapped Scott out of his drifting half-sleep. He swallowed and licked dry lips, considering the pronouncement. “Not if I have anything to say about it.”

“That’s just it,” Robinson countered resignedly. “You don’t. He’ll give you up all by him­self. The next time they put the irons to him, he’ll spill like a gutted rabbit.”

“That’s not true, man.”

“Yes it is. Kelly Robinson is a damned coward. Cries like a little frightened puppy at the least little threat of pain.”

“Stop talking like that. It isn’t true. You know it isn’t true.”

“They broke me, man. I lost it.”

“No you didn’t. I told you, I read the debriefing. You didn’t tell them anything.”

“I didn’t tell them anything they wanted to know. They thought I was CIA, that I was in­volved in some CIA operation in Tunisia. They kept grilling me about Tunisia, about some under­ground base that the CIA is operating out of. Location, manpower, defense… I dunno. I kept trying to tell them they got the wrong department, I wasn't CIA, I didn’t know anything about intelligence operations in Tunisia. Of course they didn’t believe me… so they kept up the… torture. And I couldn’t get them to stop, because I couldn’t answer their damn questions. Just Tunisia – anything about Tunisia.”

“So, that means you didn’t give anything away. You got nothing to feel guilty about.”

“But I _would_ have – don’t you understand? I was willing to tell them anything, if only they’d asked me something I could answer. I would’ve given up our people – anyone they asked for… It got so bad finally, I would have even given you up if they’d wanted you.”

“It doesn’t matter now, Kel. It’s over.”

“It does matter! You can’t trust me anymore – _I_ can’t trust me anymore. And someday I _will_ get you killed… or worse. So, please get yourself another partner… I don’t want to be responsible… for anything happening to you…”

But Scott just shook his head. “I told you already, Kelly Robinson is my partner. And I don’t give up my partners, man.”

“Not even when they’re losing their guts?”

“Especially not when they’re losing their guts… when they _think_ they’re losing their guts.”

Kelly’s breath rasped nervous, uneven, as though tears threatened to break through. The next words were so soft and half-muffled against the pillow, that Scott nearly missed them.

“You know… what they did to me?”

“Yes.”

“They raped me… you know that?”

An ice-needle of sympathy pierced Scott’s chest. “I know, man,” he answered gently. He’d read it in the medical records, the obvious evidence of sexual assault.

Kelly had to clear his throat to get the rest of the bitter words out. “Everyone got a turn… and some of them… took seconds…”

The needle stabbed deeper, glacially cold. Scott hadn't known that part. In the debriefing, Kelly had admitted to the assault only under Anderson’s direct questioning, and then only that the rape had occurred, nothing more.

Robinson’s voice quavered, his tight throat trying to clamp off words that he didn’t want to say. “They seemed to get a real kick out of… screwing an agent of the… United States govern­ment…” A long intake of breath, and he directed a question at Scott. “You know what it’s like – getting fucked… by a gang of apes?”

“No.” Unwilled moisture gathered in dark eyes. Peremptorily Scott blinked it back. “No I don’t, Kel.”

“I feel like shit… like a whimpering piece of shit. It wasn’t enough to just take my guts… they had to take my manhood too.”

Scott didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing. But he also determined, coldly, logically, as he had upon reading the report, that if he ever got ahold of the bastards to who did it, he’d kill them.

“I couldn’t scream enough…” Kelly was saying in a dead voice, his mind far away in some gruesome hell. “I screamed my throat raw… I screamed until my voice went… They threatened to… use the prod… inside me… and I think they would have before much longer… I wanted to… kill myself, but I never got the chance… They you came with the rescue party… and it was all over.”

Except it wasn’t over. It wouldn’t be over as long as Kelly’s torturers chased him every night. Scott continued to stare at the wall. Somehow this conversation was easier if they lay in the dark, just staring at the walls with their backs to each other. He had said that he was willing to listen to help Kelly heal, and he meant it – but now he wondered if he’d be able to get through it. But of course, however hard it was for him to listen, it had to be a hundred times harder for Kelly to tell it.

Kelly was losing his battle with the encroaching tears. They crept into his voice. “And now I’m gonna lose my partner… and my job… They’ve taken everything away from me, man…”

Scott frowned. “I told you, you’re not losing me,” he insisted quietly. “Not for anything. And what makes you think you’re losing your job? You just need a vacation, that’s all. Then you’ll come back fresh and healed. And I’m with you all the way, man. I’m not going anywhere.”

“No,” the white man contradicted sadly. “I can’t handle it anymore. They’ll have to dis­charge me. I’m a security risk now. I’m a coward.”

“Stop talking that way, man,” Scott insisted. “You’re not a security risk, and you can handle it. It’s just gonna take time. Anyone can be overpowered and raped. Anyone. That doesn’t mean they’re a coward.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Kelly agreed matter-of-factly. “Only if they are one already.”

“You’re not a coward, man.”

“I was willing to talk. What does that make me?”

“Kel, you’ve been through a hell of a trauma this past month. Anyone can be forced to say anything under torture. I could confess to being an axe murderer, or say that I’d be willing to blow up the whole world, if I’d gone through what you went through. Saying something under duress doesn’t make it true. It doesn’t change what you are.”

“And what I am is a coward. A gutless whimpering coward.”

Scott hear the direction of Kelly’s voice change, as Kelly’s head turned toward him in the dark. “They told you to keep an eye on me, didn’t they? Watch me, in case I try to do something stupid, like kill myself. Well, I won’t kill myself. I wanted to, right after it happened… but not any­more. You can go back and tell Anderson that I don’t need a babysitter.”

“I’m not your babysitter,” Scott insisted. “I’m your partner. Nobody has to give me orders to stay with you.”

* * * * *

 _to be continued_ …


	2. Chapter 2

Scott went out to the front room, sat on the couch in the dark. He could hardly bear the rami­fications of Robinson’s revelation. His own thoughts taunted. His own selfish thoughts. A slight nausea churned in his stomach.

Finally Robinson came out of the bedroom. “What’s wrong?” he demanded. “If you don’t want to be around me anymore, just say so. I’ll understand.”

Scott shook his head. “Kel, it’s not that. Not at all.”

“Then what?”

Scott remained silent for a few moments, then said, as if it explained everything, “You’re my partner.”

“You’re not obligated to stay,” Kelly reminded. “I mean, it’s not as if we’re married. We were just assigned together by the department. If you want a transfer, Russ will give it to you. And whatever excuse you tell him, I’ll go along with.”

A mild snort escaped Scott’s nostrils. “Obligation’s got nothing to do with it. You’re my partner, man,” he reiterated. “I’m not going anywhere. You’re closer than a brother to me. We help each other through whatever happens. That’s what partners do. Maybe we were assigned together originally, but after two years and seven months, you’re half of me, and I’m half of you. Why are you trying to get rid of me?”

“I’m not,” Robinson asserted stiffly. ‘I’m not. I’m just giving you an out, if you want to take it. I know how most men would feel being around a man who was raped…”

Scott said nothing; just sat there, elbows on knees, hands clasped in front.

Robinson watched him in the silence, then insisted, “That’s not all, is it? There’s more bug­ging you. What’s on your mind?”

“That’s all, man, that’s it.”

“No it isn’t,” Robinson countered. “You’re right, I’m half of you. And I know when you’re lying to me.”

Scott rubbed a hand over his face, a tense nervous gesture. “It’s personal, Kelly.”

“So was what I just confessed. But you made me tell you all the sordid details. You wouldn’t let go of me until I spilled my guts to you. Now you’re gonna talk to me. I’m not gonna let you go until you tell me.”

Scott was adamant. “If I tell you, you’ll hate me.”

“The only thing I’d hate you for, is learning that you knew all along that Russ was setting me up, and you didn’t warn me.”

“God no, Kel.”

“We both know that we’ve been coerced in the past to spy against each other for Internal Investigations,” Kelly reminded bluntly.

Scott’s face twisted with sick disgust. “But not like that!” he insisted. “I’d cut off my arms before I’d ever knowingly let them use me against you like that.”

“Then what?” Kelly demanded rigidly. “Tell me.”

Slowly, shakily, Scott drew a deep breath. “I’m homosexual, Kelly.”

Kelly just stared at him, the disclosure refusing to mesh in his mind, and all he could do was blurt out the illogical refutation: “No you’re not.”

A bitter smile quirked the corner of Scott’s lips.

Kelly stared at him dully, trying to assimilate the pronouncement. “But I never knew.”

“And you never would have.”

Confusion tautened Robinson’s face. “But we’ve lived together – in close quarter – for two-and-a-half years. How could I not know? How could you hide it from me?”

Again the ironic smile. “Because I’m good at keeping secrets, Kelly. It’s my job.”

Robinson stood in front of the seated man, watched him for a long time, then demanded pointedly, “Have you ever considered us… together?”

Scott said nothing.

“Tell me.”

“Don’t ask me that, Kelly.”

“Well, then obviously the answer is ‘yes’.”

“All right, yes,” Scott finally admitted. “I wished I could say something to you.” He rested his tired face in his hands. “Every time I gave you a rub-down, I wished I could do more to ease your tension. But not once did I ever act on it. And now, Russ let those bastards rape you… and I have no rights to my thoughts…”

Kelly just looked at him. Chest heaved with audible breath.

Scott didn’t even look up, but just added lamely, “So now, if _you_ want to walk out on _me_ , go ahead, I won’t stop you.”

Instead, Kelly gripped Scott’s left wrist firmly, pulled the hand away from the man’s face.

Curiously, querying, Scott looked up, wondering if Robinson intended to slug him.

But instead, Kelly just looked at him for a long moment, then the cold rigid expression soft­ened on the white man’s face. “Just give me some time,” he requested.

Scott nodded blankly, not sure what Kelly was implying.

The grip slipped into a handclasp.

“My mind and body took a pretty bad beating,” Kelly admitted. “Give me some time to heal. I can’t promise I’ll ever be the same as I was before. But once I settle down… if you really want to…”

Now it was Scott’s turn to look nonplussed. “What are you saying, Kelly?”

Kelly sat beside him on the couch. “I’m saying I had a homosexual experience… when I was a teenager… so I probably could do it again…”

“Kelly, teenagers experiment. And one experience doesn’t make someone a homosexual.”

“It was more than one experience. It was an affair with another kid in my ROTC unit in high school We fooled around whenever we could without getting caught. We got away with it maybe half-a-dozen times before we decided it was too dangerous a game to be playing if we didn’t want to jeopardize our chances for military careers.” An ironic sound snuffed softly from his nostrils. “So I gave it up twenty years ago… for this job… And then twenty years later, the job gets me screwed – literally.” Hs voice caught in his throat. “So stupid. So damn stupid.”

Scott quietly shook his head. “No. It’s more than stupid. It’s sick. Sick that Russ would deliberately set you up for that.”

“Yeah,” Robinson agreed. “And yet, you know if he heard us talking right now, we’d both be court-martialled and dishonorably discharged. Lose our careers, blacklisted for life.”

“They would make our lives a living hell.”

Another snort, this one of ironic disgust. “Oh, they’ve already done that to me. There’s not much more they could do to me. They’ve taken my honor, they’ve taken my loyalty to the agency, they’ve taken my manhood. All I’ve got left is you. I won’t let them take you away from me. And they would too, if they found out. So I guess I can’t let us risk it after all . I can’t let them take everything away from you too.”

But Scott just shook his head. “It’s not about me. We’ve agreed we’re partners. Partners live and die for each other. I don’t care what they do to me. They got their last loyalty from me when I found you lying on the floor of that hell-hole, when Russ admitted they had deliberately sent you into that.”

Kelly’s hand rested on Scott’s thigh. A flash of heat surged up Scott’s nerves. The fingers squeezed gently.

“Then come back to bed,” the white man suggested, a tilt of head indicating the bedroom. “It’s cold out here.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure. At the start of this conversation, you said you wanted to help me heal. Then come help. I need it,” he added softly. “I need someone to take away what those bastards did to me.”

Scott’s hand found its way to caress the top of the hand gently squeezing his thigh. “I can’t take it away, man. I wish I could,” he apologized. “There’s no need to rush. I’ve waited two-and-a-half years. I can wait a little longer.”

Kelly shook his head. “I can’t. I can still feel them in me. When I think of someone in me, I’d rather think of you, not them. I don’t want to think of them anymore. I need it, man.”

Scott looker over at him. Kelly was watching him, neck resting against the back of the couch, vulnerability open on the white man’s face. The warmth coursing through Scott’s blood was not ignorable.

Leaning toward his partner, as though a decision had just been made – for them both – Scott slipped a hand to Kelly’s neck. The skin was warm and slightly tacky to his touch, the pulse bound­ing beneath his palm. Gently he fingered the thick short hair at Kelly’s nape, while his gaze drank in the hunger and the plea in hazel eyes.

Kelly reached up to him, and started to move forward; Scott blocked the move gently and shook his head. Acquiescently Kelly lay back and allowed Scott to set the rhythm.

Scott’s thumb stroked a brown sideburn, then caressed thin lips. Kelly just lay there and watched him, nervous breath trembling in his chest, and let Scott do whatever he wanted.

For awhile, all Scott wanted to do was look. Hesitant – as though if he attempted any more, this apparent reality would resolve back into imagination once again.

Kelly seemed to read his mind. “I’m not going anywhere.”

A tiny smile teased full lips. “I guess I’m just scared, Kel.”

Kelly answered against the thumb carefully stroking his own lips. “So am I, man. Absolutely scared shitless. But don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

“Whatever you say… partner,” Scott consented, then leaned over the other man close enough to press mouth to mouth.

A moan rumbled in Kelly’s throat, and Scott felt the body beneath him stiffen and tremble. Immediately he started to pull away for fear of reviving brutal memories, but Kelly insistently reached up to take hold of Scott’s head and hold him to the kiss.

Suddenly the tentative inquisitiveness of the kiss gave way to desperation and hunger; teeth crushed the soft flesh of lips, tongues probed assertively, hot breath rushed down each other’s throat.  
  


* * * * *

 _to be continued someday_ …


End file.
